There is a proverbial scene in the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding when Toula’s father plays one of his favourite word games while driving. He says, and I quote: “Give me a word, any word, and I show you how the root of that word is Greek”. I admit to enjoying this game myself (although with just a little less nationalistic fervour).

Sitting in our study on a cold Canberra night enjoying a cup of Milo, it suddenly occurred to me … “Milo”. Surely it couldn’t be Greek? Or perhaps it is!

Milo, for the sake of international readers, is a malt powder drink (made of milk powder, malt barley, sugar and cocoa) invented in Australia under the brand Nestlé. It is widely consumed by children and some discerning adults. Children either eat Milo mixed in the ratio of 9:1 (9 parts Milo, 1 part milk) or blow bubbles in it with a straw (occasionally drinking small quantities). Adults drink it as a warming drink on cold nights, sometimes with a splash of rum depending on how much work they need to do that evening. Milo is packaged in large 1.5 kg and 1.9kg tins (nobody buys the smaller ones) and it has a distinctive green label and logo. In 1934, the Australian food scientist Thomas Mayne (1901-1995) developed Milo to help improve children’s nutrition during The Great Depression (because apart from sugar and cocoa it has a few vitamins and minerals).

Now for the Greek bit…

As it turns out, the brand name ‘Milo’ is a reference to the ancient wrestler, Milo of Croton (Croton was a Greek colony in Southern Italy)!! Milo lived in the 6^th century BC and was famous for winning no less than six Olympic victories. He is credited with incredible feats of strength, including training by carrying a bull on his shoulders (a printed image of this scene appeared on the first Milo tin labels in the 1930’s, see image above). He led an army in a war against Sybaris in 510 B.C. and was victorious. He seems to have been a rather Herculean figure, dressing in animal skins and eating whole animals to satisfy his enormous appetite.

What a fantastically appropriate name for an energy drink! And it is of Greek derivation!! Thomas Mayne was certainly paying attention to his Classics lessons at Trinity Grammar School in Melbourne.

Now, back to My Big Fat Greek Milo, which is just as delicious cold.

NB. A couple of interesting links:

Above is a clear photo of a vintage Milo tin depicting Milo of Croton carrying the bull on his shoulders.

And below is a link to the funniest and worst cinema advertisement I could ever imagine for Milo. It was screened in 1948 and is called “A Milo family album”. I think the killer line is “I’m still interested in rabbits, but strictly for research”:

https://aso.gov.au/titles/ads/nestles-milo-cinema-family/clip1/

Yes, I have posted this blog twice. First in early May and again today. Mostly because I have more readers now and I want everyone to know that MILO IS GREEK!!

To my horror, ABC’s language researcher Tiger Webb posted an article today on the ABC online news site entitled: “The ‘rules’ of grammar are made up, so why bother following them?”

Well, Tiger, it seems you need a wake-up call.

Rules have been ‘made up’ to govern most of our activities in life. That fact alone is not an argument for not following the rules. Just because someone invented road rules doesn’t mean we can choose whether or not to follow them, and just because someone invented rules about food hygiene doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to eat raw chicken! Of course, failing to construct a proper sentence is not going to cause a major traffic incident or salmonella poisoning but the underlying principle is the same. Not following rules because they are ‘made up’  is a specious, half-baked, stupid argument that one would not expect from an ABC researcher.

Secondly, just because rules are complex and difficult does not mean they should be ignored. There is a compelling argument for maintaining language standards and that argument is based on quality, precision and longstanding good practice. Ancient Greek and Roman writers spent a great deal of time considering the subject of grammar and expression, different styles of speech, how to achieve clarity or grandeur in speech and how to persuade. They explicitly advocated the reading of poetry and oratory to refine one’s language and expression to a high standard. There is a reason why the nine Greek Muses were goddesses of artful speech and storytelling along with different styles of poetry! These language standards were transmitted through education in the classical tradition into the English language tradition.

Tiger does not believe that English language is in crisis. As a matter of fact, I agree. There is no crisis: just a gradual, pathetic, downward slide in the direction of apathy and “duzza matta” attitude. For my part, I think it is vitally important to speak properly, to write concisely and clearly in proper sentences and to observe the proper rules of grammar. In an increasingly competitive job environment, why wouldn’t you want your writing and speech to stand out as structured, considered and grammatically correct?

Tiger recommends that we should avoid “blind adherence to rules” (particularly grammatical ones) because there are plentiful instances of those rules being broken, even by their very proponents. Well, isn’t that a good reason to abandon the rules altogether! Why bother teaching our children to speak properly at all?

When my three-year old daughter says “Mummy, d’ you r’member when we drived to the coast?” should I sing her praises for dropping vowels and mutilating the past tense of the verb ‘drive’? A gold sticker for originality, my dear! And when my son comes home from school and suggests “Well, like, we could do some paper craft”, Tiger’s approach suggests that I should just accept with open arms the use of ‘like’ as an exclamation instead of a noun, adjective or verb. Hooray, my son, for embracing yet another “rogue American” expression. You can add “awesome”, “cool”, “often times” and “yeah” to that list.

Sorry Tiger. Language standards are important and grammar is even more important. I am going to continue to teach my children to speak properly and construct proper sentences. I will continue to reject rubbish English. Indeed, if Tiger Webb is anything to go by, it is up to us as parents and teachers because we can no longer rely on the ABC to keep up the language standard.

Tiger, this fable is just for you:

“Once, there was a tiger who had a large treasure. He reasoned that because the treasure was so large, no one would steal it from him so he fell fast asleep under a tree. As he slept, each of the animals took a small piece of the treasure until there was nothing left. When the tiger woke up, he looked in alarm and said “Woe is me, I fell asleep and lost everything I once had”.

Link to ABC article:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-05-29/why-your-wrong-to-care-about-grammar/8561860

Image sourced from:

https://www.doyouyoga.com/how-to-do-the-sleeping-tiger-and-awaken-the-observer-within/

It’s not every night that you get invited to a Roman Dinner! Fetch my toga Antoninus! Call in the peacocks, musicians and scantily clad slaves! What will be on the menu? Snails, oysters, or dare I say it, both?

The Annual Winter Roman Dinner was hosted by the Friends of the Australian National University Classics Museum on Friday 26 May. It took place at the Teatro Vivaldi Restaurant which is an intimate, theatrical and delightful venue on the university campus grounds:

I was invited to attend as guest of Emeritus Professor Elizabeth Minchin. It was a lovely opportunity to chat to Elizabeth over dinner, to celebrate my new role in Classics, and to reacquaint myself with the very dedicated Friends of the ANU Classics Museum. The Friends group has been operating since 1985, promoting the ANU Classics Museum and encouraging interest in antiquity in the wider community. The Friends are responsible for all of the wonderful fundraising for the museum and the acquisition of new items, including coins, vases and glass items.

The dinner speaker was Associate Professor McComas Taylor, speaking on the topic of ‘Salvēte/Namaste: A Sanskritist’s Response to the European Classics’. McComas was, as always, tremendously engaging, entertaining and informative.

The menu was very carefully designed to reflect ancient Roman cuisine so Mark (the owner of Vivaldi’s) was under careful instruction not to use any of the following: tomatoes, potatoes, citrus, sugar, pasta, pizza, rice, coffee, chocolate, peppers or zucchini.

Here is the specially adapted menu:

On Arrival

Bread with olive oil and balsamic vinegar

Entrée

Oysters with red vinegar

Tuna with oregano olives

Main Course

Duck legs with braised red cabbage

Lentils with carrots and celery

Roasted lamb stuffed with dates

Honeyed carrots, roasted parsnips and green beans

Dessert

Honey cheesecake with fig sauce

Pears poached with red wine and honey

So the verdict was (drumroll please): oysters!

And the rest of the dinner was lovely too, especially the duck leg with braised red cabbage and lentils:

My warm thanks to Elizabeth for a delightful evening and celebration; to Marcel Dimo, the President of the Friends of the ANU Classics Museum and all of the friends for a terrific event.

Salutaria!

Links:

The Friends: https://slll.anu.edu.au/classics-museum/friends

The Museum: https://slll.anu.edu.au/classics-museum

The Restaurant: http://www.vivaldirestaurant.com.au/

Create your own Roman cuisine using: John Edwards, Roman Cookery, Hartley and Marks, Washington, 1986.

I just sipped my sage tea (faskomilo) out of a fifth century BC drinking vessel! I’m quite serious, take a look:

These cups are hand-thrown and hand-painted using a clay-based black slip and an ancient manufacturing process that has remained unchanged for thousands of years (the very same manufacturing process that was used to produce Attic pottery in the sixth to fifth centuries B.C.!). For a long time, chemists, archaeologists and ceramicists tried to reproduce the famous Attic black glaze without success. In 1993, archaeological scientist Dr Eleni Aloupi provided the most precise reproduction of the technique (involving carefully selected natural clays and a complex firing technique). Now, she and her team are able to reproduce Attic black pottery that cannot be distinguished from centuries-old originals. Amazing!

The style of this cup is ancient but it is also modern, practical and very comfortable to hold. It makes sense to have the handle this shape and size and positioned so close to the rim and when yours is full of hot tea you will see why. The black slip is luscious to look at and the slight texture of the clay surface makes the cup really pleasant to hold. There is an earthiness and authenticity about drinking from a natural clay vessel. I enjoy imagining that the same cup might have been at an ancient bard’s side as he recited the Odyssey to a wide-eyed audience; or on Aristotle’s desk as he wrote the finishing chapters of his Historia Animalium; or in Herodotus’ rucksack as he travelled around Egypt; and certainly on the bedside or near the loom in the Athenian women’s quarters.

But the real surprise is yet to come. On the base of each cup, there is a delightful painted image to be enjoyed by the person sitting opposite every time the cup is lifted for a drink. It might be a scantily clad male figure, a woman’s head, or some other surprise. What a neat detail.

I can’t think of a more appropriate ancient beverage to sip from this cup than sage tea. This herbal tea (known to modern Greeks as faskomilo <<Φασκόμηλο>>) is made from dried sage leaves grown high in the mountains of Greece. It is much more aromatic and pungent than the type we are familiar with in Australia. It is very high in antioxidants and polyphenols (just like green tea) and it helps with digestion. The many benefits of sage were well known to the ancient Greeks and Romans (such as the Greek physician Dioscorides from the first century AD).

Tea anyone?

For further information visit: http://www.atticblack.com/

I am delighted to share the good news that I have just accepted an offer of employment from the Australian National University as Lecturer in Classics within the School of Literature, Languages and Linguistics!

It has been a very long and arduous 18-year path. I taught for eight years at the Australian National University alongside completing my Undergraduate, Honours and Postgraduate degrees. Then I switched track, working as a government solicitor and later mentoring law students on the cusp of their professional careers. But the biggest challenge was maintaining a teaching profile and pursuing my classics career alongside raising two very young children. Last year, for example, my husband and I juggled caring for our children whilst I rushed to and from the university to teach ancient Greek during lunchtimes. There have been many days, late nights and weekends marking grammar assignments and writing exam papers; working on my forthcoming book; writing a journal article; preparing grant applications; and compiling a job application.

All the hard work and effort has now paid off. I have to say that working regular full-time daylight hours will be a relief after the very irregular working hours that I have been keeping. I am also really looking forward to having a dedicated office space for writing and research.

My deepest thanks to my sweet husband and our children for their love, patience and steadfast belief in my abilities. My sincerest thanks to my referees for their words of admiration and support. And thanks to all of my dear colleagues, friends and students who have held out hopes for me.

The sun is rising. It’s a new and exciting chapter. And I promise to keep you posted on all of the next developments…

Mmmm. I hope my office has room for a coffee machine!!

 

Today, many folk around the world celebrated Mother’s Day. Traditionally, mothers are given letters, cards, flowers, or gifts in recognition of their role as nurturers, carers and contributors to society. I was lucky enough to get a sleep in, a lovely breakfast and lots of cuddles with my children.

From my own personal experience, I can say that motherhood is the most wonderful, amazing, difficult and terrifying thing I have ever experienced. Our children are a daily delight, a test of patience, a source of great humour as well as endless interest and concern.

Here are three of Aesop’s fables about mothering and motherhood from the sixth century BC, as a common sense antidote to the commercial subtext and saccharine sentimentality that sometimes overshadows Mother’s Day. As usual, these fables evoke a great deal of good humour, practicality and ‘salt of the earth’ wisdom. The morals attached to fables are usually later additions and they are often misleading so I have omitted them. It is much more fun extracting a moral for oneself.

1. The Beauty Contest

Zeus had decided to award prizes to the most beautiful animal babies so he inspected each and every one of them in order to reach a decision. The monkey also participated, claiming to be the mother of a very beautiful baby: a naked, snub-nosed little monkey whom she cradled in her arms. When the gods took a look at that monkey, they all started to laugh but his mother insisted, “The winner is for Zeus to decide! But in my eyes this one is the most beautiful of all.”

2. The Monkey’s Children

The monkey gives birth to two babies but after giving birth she does not mother them equally. She comforts one of them with cruel embraces, choking him with her unfortunate affection; meanwhile, she casts the other child away as superfluous and unimportant. This is the one who goes off into the wilds and is able to survive.

3. The Woman and Her Two Daughters

There was a woman who was the mother of two daughters, and she had married them both off: one to a gardener and the other to a potter. She then paid a visit to the daughter who was married to the gardener, and as they talked about things in general the mother asked her daughter how she was faring. The daughter said, ‘In general, things are good, but please pray that there will be some rainfall, so that the vegetables will be well-watered and flourish accordingly.’ The mother then left and went to see the daughter who was living with the potter. She asked the daughter what she might need, and the daughter replied, ‘In general, things are good, mother, but please pray that we have clear weather and hot sunny days without a cloud in the sky so that the pots will dry out more quickly.’ At this point the mother said, ‘But if you are hoping for clear skies and your sister wants a downpour, then how am I going to pray for the two of you?’

1. Aesop’s Fables (translated by Laura Gibbs) 2002, available at:

http://www.mythfolklore.net/aesopica/oxford/253.htm

2. Aesop’s Fables (translated by Laura Gibbs) 2002, available at:

http://www.mythfolklore.net/aesopica/oxford/497.htm

3. Aesop’s Fables (translated by Laura Gibbs) 2002, available at:

http://www.mythfolklore.net/aesopica/oxford/548.htm

4. Image from Lloyd W. Daly, Aesop Without Morals (illustrated by Grace Muscarella), New York, Thomas Yoseloff, 1961, p. 184.

Plato’s Republic hasn’t always received the most positive reviews yet the basic theme of the work is a simple and important one: how to govern society in the best way possible. This question is as relevant now as it was then. Plato answers this question with a philosophical dialogue led by Socrates in discussion with two others named Glaucon and Adeimantus.

Recently, I have had cause to revisit The Republic to examine Plato’s descriptions of four imperfect types of society and the corresponding types of individual that each of these societies produce (the timarchic character, the oligarchic character, the democratic character and the tyrant). Interestingly, Plato outlines how each of these individual types comes to be (in terms of their childhood and upbringing). He then sketches their traits in adulthood, and how they conduct themselves in social, political and personal life.

I find Plato’s analysis of the tyrant particularly interesting. Plato defines a tyrant as “one who, either by birth or habit or both, combines the characteristics of drunkenness, lust, and madness”. Here is a brief account of this type’s childhood and early years:

“[H]e’s drawn toward complete licence (which his tempters call complete liberty), his father and family support moderation, and his tempters come in on the other side. And when the wicked wizards who want to make him a tyrant despair of keeping their hold on the young man by other means, they contrive to implant a master passion in him to control the idle desires that divide his time between them, like a giant winged drone – unless you can think of a better description for such a passion?”

…

“The other desires buzz around it, loading it with incense and perfume, flowers and wine, and all the pleasures of a dissolute life, on which they feed and fatten it until at last they produce in it the sting of mania. Then the master passion runs wild and takes madness into its service; any opinions or desires with a decent reputation and any feelings of shame still left are killed or thrown out, until all discipline is swept away, and madness usurps its place.” (572d-573b)

He next becomes a type of popular leader, ultimately transforming into a tyrant:

“The mob will do anything he tells them, and the temptation to shed a brother’s blood is too strong. He brings the usual unjust charges against him, takes him to court and murders him, thus destroying a human life, and getting an unholy taste of the blood of his fellows. Exiles, executions, hints of cancellation of debts and redistribution of land follow, till their instigator is inevitably and fatally bound either to be destroyed by his enemies, or to change from man to wolf and make himself a tyrant.” (565e)

How does the tyrant behave when he first tastes power?

“In his early days he has a smile and a kind word for everyone; he says he’s no tyrant, makes large promises, public and private, frees debtors, distributes land to the people and to his own followers, and puts on a generally mild and kindly air.

…

But I think we will find that when he has disposed of his foreign enemies by treaty or destruction, and has no more to fear from them, he will in the first place continue to stir up war in order that the people may continue to need a leader.

…

And the very high level of war taxation will also enable him to reduce them to poverty and force them to attend to earning their daily bread rather than to plotting against him.

…

Finally if he suspects anyone of having ideas of freedom and not submitting to his rule, he can find an excuse to get rid of them by handing them over to the enemy. For all these reasons a tyrant must always be provoking war.”

He loses all restraint and collects a gang of followers:

“[U]nder the tyranny of the master passion he becomes in his waking life what he was once only occasionally in his dreams, and there’s nothing, no taboo, no murder, however terrible, from which he will shrink. His passion tyrannizes over him, a despot without restraint or law, and drives him (as a tyrant drives a state) into any venture that will profit itself and its gang, a gang collected partly from the evil company he keeps and partly from impulses within himself which these same evil practices have freed from restraint.” (574e-575a)

In the midst of all this, he leads a life of utter misery and unhappiness:

“The tyrannical character, therefore, whom you judged to be the most wretched of men because of the harvest of evils produced by the disorder prevailing within him, is in all these ways still worse off when he ceases to be a private citizen, and is compelled by fate to become a real tyrant and to control others though he cannot control himself. It’s just as if you compelled an invalid or paralytic to spend his life on military service or in athletic competitions instead of living quietly at home.”

“Yes, that’s a very apt comparison, Socrates.”

“And so, my dear Glaucon, will you agree that the actual tyrant’s condition is utterly wretched, and his life harder than the one you thought hardest?”

“I entirely agree.”

“So, whatever people may think, the truth is that the real tyrant is really a slave of the most abject kind dependent on scoundrels. He can never satisfy his desires, and behind his multitudinous wants you can see, if you know how to survey it as a whole, the real impoverishment of his character; his life is haunted by fear and – if the condition of the state he rules is any guide, as we know it is – torn by suffering and misery. Do you agree?’

“Very much so”, he replied.

“Add to all that we said before, that his power will make him still more envious, untrustworthy, unjust, friendless, and godless, a refuge and a home for every iniquity, and you can see that he’s a source of misery above all to himself, but also to his neighbours.” (579d)

The ancient Greeks of course, were not fans of tyranny. And Plato had his own unique ideas about who was best placed to lead society. But his character portrait of the tyrant we can certainly relate to, so much so that in the introduction to the Penguin translation Sir Desmond Lee states that on the subject of the tyrant there is “little need to comment on [Plato’s] analysis. The dominance of a dictator’s personality, his private army, the purges among his followers are familiar. We might comment that his private life need not always be as wildly dissolute as Plato suggests; he is more formidable, though not necessarily less criminal or violent if it is not. But we still associate autocracy with repression and violence.” (p.30)

For my part, I find Plato’s analysis of the extent of a tyrant’s personal unhappiness particularly useful and insightful. As the tyrant’s power increases, so his unhappiness increases. There seems to be a degree of natural justice in this equation. In this sense, the tyrant is more an object of pity than wonder. And far from gaining ultimate control, it is ironic that the tyrant only achieves further personal enslavement.

Plato, The Republic (2^nd ed.)(transl. by D. Lee), Penguin Books, London, 1974.

 

 

Atalanta and Hippomenes, Guido Reni c. 1622–25

A recent visit to a cross-country carnival brought back a memory of a wonderful but lesser known myth from ancient Greece: the story of Atalanta and Hippomenes.

Atalanta was the daughter of Clymene and either Iasus of Arcadia or Schoeneus of Boeotia. As an infant, Atalanta was exposed on a mountainside because her father was hoping for a son. Atalanta survived because she was suckled by a she-bear and later raised by hunters. She learned to hunt wild animals, use a bow and run like the wind.

Like Artemis, the virgin goddess of the hunt, Atalanta spurned marriage. She told her father that if a man wanted to marry her, he would have to defeat her in a running race, but if the man lost, he would have to be killed. Atalanta was extremely beautiful so many men competed for her hand in marriage and many lost.

Until Hippomenes appeared on the scene: the man with the golden balls. He stepped forward as a contender in the race. Atalanta’s heart burned at the sight of him: so young and so handsome. She doubted whether she wanted to win or lose the race. Unknown to her, Aphrodite had given Hippomenes three golden apples to distract Atalanta during the course of the race. The rest of the story is told by Aphrodite herself:

“The trumpets sound the start: both crouching low

Flash from their marks and skim the sandy course

With flying feet; it seemed that they could race

Dry-shod across the surface of the sea

And over the standing heads of harvest corn.

The shouting crowd cheered on the newcomer:

‘Run, run, Hippomenes! Now is your chance!

Now! Faster! Faster! Run with all your speed!

You’re going to win!’ And hard it was to know

Who liked their words the more, Hippomenes

Or Atalanta. Many a time she slowed

When she might pass and gazed into his eyes,

And with a heavy heart left him behind.

And now he flagged, his breath came fast and dry

And there was far to go; so then he threw

One of the three gold apples from the tree.

She was amazed and, eager to secure

The gleaming fruit, swerved sideways from the track

And seized the golden apple as it rolled.

He passed her and the benches roared applause.

She with a burst of speed repaired her waste

Of time and soon again left him behind.

He threw the second apple and again

She stopped, and followed, and again ran past.

And so the last lap came. ‘Be with me now,

Goddess’, he prayed, ‘who gavest me the gift.’

And then with all the strength of youth he threw

The shining gold far out across the field,

The longer to delay the girl; and she

Seemed undecided, but I made her chase

The rolling apple and increased its weight,

And by its weight alike and loss of speed

I hindered her. And, not to make my tale

More lengthy than the race, she lost the day

And he, victorious, led his prize away.” (1)

Ovid gives us such a charming description of a favourite ancient and modern athletic pastime: the race. The excitement and adrenalin is palpable and there is the added complexity of Atalanta’s indecision about whether to win or to lose the race to her handsome competitor. I imagine Athenian mothers retelling the myth to their daughters to warn them against crafty men seeking to lure them with gold trinkets. I can imagine Athenian fathers retelling the myth to their sons to show how a little cunning and a little divine aid can go a long way in securing a bride. And I can imagine grandmothers telling the myth to their grandchildren to tell them to run a straight course in life and not, under any circumstances, to be diverted from their aim. And then, of course, there is the lesson from the wondrous Aphrodite herself – that no one, yesterday, today or tomorrow, is beyond her power.

(1) Ovid, Metamorphoses (transl. A. D. Melville), Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1986, p. 246.

(2) Image from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippomenes

It’s been two weeks and counting. I’m still waiting to hear the outcome of the job interview. Now is an opportunity to practice a virtue that is not my strong point: patience.

The ancient Greek word for patience is hupomoné (ὑπομονή) from hypo meaning “under” and moné from the verb meno meaning “to stay, remain or endure”.

“Staying under” seems like an appropriate definition of patience. The yoke is firmly attached and one just has to keep plodding on in the direction of one’s aim. If I throw off the yoke, abandon the task and walk out in contempt, the opportunity to practice patience has been lost.

Are there any fables about patience to guide me? Perhaps this one:

The Fox with the Swollen Belly.

A hungry fox spied some bread and meat left in a hollow tree by some shepherds. He crawled in and ate it, but his belly swelled so that could not get out again. As he moaned and groaned, another fox passing by came up and asked what was the matter. When he heard what had happened, he said to the first fox. “I guess you’ll just have to wait. When your belly goes back to it’s original size, you won’t have any trouble getting out.” (1)

It’s time for me to stop moaning and groaning. Time fixes everything.

(1) Adapted from Lloyd W. Daly, Aesop Without Morals, Thomas Yoseloff, New York, 1961, p. 103.

There is a proverbial scene in the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding when Toula’s father plays one of his favourite word games while driving. He says, and I quote: “Give me a word, any word, and I show you how the root of that word is Greek”. I admit to enjoying this game myself (although with more refined grammar and just a little less nationalistic fervour).

Sitting in our study on a cold Canberra night working on my next journal article and enjoying a cup of Milo, it suddenly occurred to me … “Milo”. Surely it couldn’t be Greek. Or perhaps it is!

Milo, for the sake of international readers, is a malt powder drink (made of milk powder, malt barley, sugar and cocoa) invented in Australia under the brand Nestlé. It is widely consumed by children and some discerning adults. Children either eat Milo mixed in the ratio of 9:1 (9 parts Milo, 1 part milk) or blow bubbles in it with a straw (occasionally drinking small quantities). Adults drink it as a warming drink on cold nights, sometimes with a splash of rum depending on how much work they need to do that evening. Milo is packaged in large 1.5 kg and 1.9kg tins (nobody buys the smaller ones) and it has a distinctive green label and logo. In 1934, the Australian food scientist Thomas Mayne (1901-1995) developed Milo to help improve children’s nutrition during The Great Depression (because apart from sugar and cocoa it has a few vitamins and minerals).

Now for the Greek bit…

As it turns out, the brand name ‘Milo’ is a reference to the ancient wrestler, Milo of Croton (Croton was a Greek colony in Southern Italy)!! Milo lived in the 6^th century BC and was famous for winning no less than six Olympic victories. He is credited with incredible feats of strength, including training by carrying a bull on his shoulders (a printed image of this scene appeared on the first Milo tin labels in the 1930’s). He led an army in a war against Sybaris in 510 B.C. and was victorious. He seems to have been a rather Herculean figure, dressing in animal skins and eating whole animals to satisfy his enormous appetite.

What a fantastically appropriate name for an energy drink! And it is of Greek derivation!! Thomas Mayne was certainly paying attention to his Classics lessons at Trinity Grammar School in Melbourne.

Now, back to My Big Fat Greek Milo, which is just as delicious cold.

NB. A couple of interesting links:

Above is a clear photo of a vintage Milo tin depicting Milo of Croton carrying the bull on his shoulders.

And below is a link to the funniest and worst cinema advertisement I could ever imagine for Milo. It was screened in 1948 and is called “A Milo family album”. I think the killer line is “I’m still interested in rabbits, but strictly for research”:

https://aso.gov.au/titles/ads/nestles-milo-cinema-family/clip1/